


an almost constant never

by WingsOfTime



Series: roza [5]
Category: Guild Wars 2 (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Touch-Starved, maybe they were both emotionally stunted all along, much too light to tag for non-con but at one point that assumption is made and quickly dismissed, sexual/suggestive situation, somewhat of a character study, spoilers for lws4ep5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-18 02:18:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18976585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WingsOfTime/pseuds/WingsOfTime
Summary: The Commander does not ever gaze longingly when two people show each other the slightest modicum of affection. He does not ever look for excuses to touch someone, to feel the warmth of their hand on his arm.Canach has long since accepted he does not like to be touched, and keeps his distance accordingly. But sometimes things simply... do not add up.





	an almost constant never

It is interesting that however much you go through with someone, however much you _learn_ about them in their darkest moments, in the heat of battle, in the held breath of victory, you can still be unaware of some of the simplest facts of their existence.

Canach has long-since established that Roza does not like to be touched. He does not shy away from physical contact, per se, but he never initiates it either. He tolerates it; some of Kasmeer’s hugs even get awkwardly returned, but that is as far as he ever goes. Canach makes note of this early on, of course—he _is_ terribly clever.

Braham’s hug of comfort after Aurene dies does not last any longer than it absolutely has to.  When Rox nudges and snorts at Roza in that… odd way charr do, he usually looks puzzled (although on one memorable occasion he had plucked a leaf off his head and handed it to her in what he seemed to think was an exchange). When Canach or Rytlock haul him up after he falls in battle, his grasp does not linger, and neither do theirs. Roza keeps his distance. Roza stands apart from the group. Roza sleeps underneath his griffon’s wing, guarded from the rest of the world.

So this, naturally, comes as a bit of a surprise.

They have missed the airship to Elona. Canach has money to collect, and Roza… well, he doesn’t know what Roza’s business there is, but it is almost certainly odd. The next flight is apparently in the middle of the night if they do not wish to wait until morning. Canach wants his money as soon as possible—you never know when another Elder Dragon will pop up and call off all of your bets—and Roza seems urgent as well, so they have decided to wait.

And Roza is… sleeping on him.

It is most definitely _strange_ , if not unwelcome. He had sat down next to Canach, and soon enough his head-nodding had turned to head-drooping, and then, well. Now Canach’s shoulder is apparently an unorthodox pillow.

He _is_ actually asleep, which is the oddest part. Soul-sucking void eyes closed, mouth slightly open. Canach experimentally plucks a leaf from his head, and he doesn’t so much as react. Canach decides to keep the leaf; surely he can think of a way to turn it into ribbing material before Roza wakes up.

His head is warm on Canach’s shoulder. His glow is pushing back the harshness of his austere taste in fashion, bathing both fabric and colourless bark in lavender in soft, slow pulses. Canach studies him idly as he waits, trying not to move too much. He notices for the first time, now that they are this close together, that their colours clash.

It is getting close to the next airship’s departure. Canach has a brief, internal debate over how harshly to wake Roza up. How much entertainment is worth the risk of all his armour magically rotting off in a fit of sleep-deprived vengeance? How likely is Roza to exact said vengeance no matter how slight the blow to his pride?

Canach gently shakes him awake.

“You’re going to go bald,” he comments as Roza slowly comes to, narrow fingers pressing into the divots of Canach’s armour to orient himself.

Roza blinks at him slowly. His hands do not move.

“What?” he croaks, voice still soft with sleep.

Canach drops the small purple leaf into his lap. Roza stares at it, fingers tightening around his elbow but still not leaving. Canach can feel the touch against his bark; small pinpricks of pressure slotting into the vulnerable points of his armour.

Roza’s posture is strangely relaxed. Unguarded, even. Canach doesn’t understand _why—_ he of all people should know to never let his guard down. But he chooses not comment on it.

One of Roza’s hands detaches from him—slowly, almost hesitantly—and picks up the leaf. He puts it on Canach’s head. For a moment, taking in his expression, his body language, the sluggishness of his movements, Canach is sure he is going to say something startlingly sentimental.

Roza says, “And even now, I’m still less bald than you.”

Canach scoffs, shaking his grip loose. He pretends not to notice how quickly Roza stiffens, or how his smile sloughs off his face like snow from a shaken branch.

His shoulder feels cold.

~*~

After that, Roza begins to keep at least a foot of distance between them. Canach does not mind, although he does not know whether to classify the avoidance as recession or juvenile petulance. At one point he brushes some dirt off of Roza’s shoulder to solidify a watery hypothesis, and Roza goes still as a statue until he retracts his hand. Canach tells himself not to take it personally.

He considers asking Roza how close he was to people when he was “growing up,” as he once put it. But he does not for a couple of reasons: he thinks the answer is blatantly obvious, for one, and explaining to Roza that he is prying into his personal affairs for his own personal entertainment is worth neither confirming it nor the squelching animal remains that will mysteriously appear in Canach’s boots for weeks to come.

But now that his attention has been piqued, the matter is a damned curiosity. Why does Roza never react negatively, or even just tell anyone to stop touching him? What would make him react positively? Why in the name of the Mother Tree had he thought Canach’s armour was comfortable enough to willingly fall asleep on, thorns and all?

No one trusts Canach that much. Why had Roza chosen _him_ , of all prickly people? He should have dozed on _Rytlock_.

The next opportunity he has to puzzle the situation out comes sooner than he anticipates.

They are browsing the marketplace of Amnoon. Canach is looking for disgustingly overpriced junk to splurge on, and Roza has shown some interest in the local jewelry businesses. The sky is yawning into evening—the casino’s prime time is near. Canach cannot wait.

There is a human that has been eyeing Roza for a few minutes now. Their artfully done makeup and open dress, as well as the way their eyes spark when Roza picks up some of the more expensive items to inspect, marks their interest as perhaps not entirely without merit.

Roza, for his part, doesn’t seem to have noticed at all. Canach chooses not to give him a heads up when the human waltzes up to him with a charming, painted smile.

“Hello there,” they greet, voice smooth and melodic. Roza glances up.

“Hello,” he says back. He says nothing more for a second, before apparently remembering something and belatedly adding, “May I help you?”

“I hope you can.” The human reaches forward, curling a hand and resting it against the bare bark of Roza’s shoulder. Their smile loosens.

Roza looks at them. Canach waits for him to freeze up, to step away, but he does nothing, only idly inspects the human’s outfit. His gaze does not linger on their open chest or the slits in their skirt, simply takes it all in for a second before flicking back up.

The human seems to take this as indication of interest. Their lids droop, and their fingers press into the swirl of Roza’s bark, thumb slowly stroking over the pattern. Canach doesn’t have the heart to tell them that he looks at dead animals in the same manner.

Roza’s eyes dart to the hand on his shoulder. He watches the human trace the grooves on his arm, up, down, up again. He still doesn’t tell them to stop.

The human sways closer. “I’ve never met one of your kind before,” they say. “But you seem to speak the same languages as the rest of us, hm?”

Their wink and posture make it clear what ‘language’ they are attempting to communicate in right now. They’d have better luck trying to seduce an _actual_ tree. Canach snickers to himself, and then badly hides it with a cough.

Roza tilts his head. “I’m not multilingual,” he says. “Sorry.”

“For the meager price of a few gold,” the human purrs, “I could educate you.”

“I think my business in Elona can be conducted fairly efficiently as is,” Roza says. He holds up the trinket he had been thumbing. “Are you the vendor of this stall?”

The human steps back, face slotting into a more neutral expression as they finally seem to understand that Roza isn’t what they're looking for. As their hand leaves his shoulder, fingers brushing his bark one last time, his grip tightens momentarily around the trinket, but he says nothing.

The human murmurs their excuses before leaving, presumably to find someone else. Roza stares after their retreating form. “That was… abrupt,” he comments.

Canach snorts. “If you wanted them to stay, you should have paid them. I’m sure they would have been _happy_ to touch and poke you for an entire evening.”

He shudders, remembering for a fleeting moment how curious the other races can truly be about sylvari. His attention leaves Roza, turning instead to the vending stall as he searches for something shiny to distract himself. If a random stranger touched _Canach_ like that, he would cut their hand off without so much as a warning.

~*~

Canach can’t sleep on this human bed—the damned fabric is too soft. It catches on his thorns, sticking to him like an unwanted lover. Maybe it is because he is awake that the bolt of panic, when it comes, strikes him so clearly.

It takes him a few seconds to figure out what is going on. _Canach_ isn’t in any danger, and there are no other sylvari in the immediate vicinity whose emotions might creep in like a bad dream, so that means—

Roza.

Canach is up before he is even fully alert. His sword is an immediate, comforting weight in his hand, and that and a blind handful of mines is all he thinks to grab before he slips into his boots and stalks out of the inn.

He inhales deeply as the cool desert wind breathes across his face, and closes his eyes, trying to focus. He had never been the most empathetic sylvari, but he can _try_ , thorns, especially since the last time he had ignored the urgency of a similar feeling, Roza had ended up gold-stained burnt bark rotting on a cliff.

He opens his eyes. Still, it isn’t enough.

“Plant person. White like snow. Short,” he snaps to the nearest loiterer. They give him a confused look before inching away, muttering about mutated glowing choyas.

Canach pinches the bridge of his nose. _Threatening innocent civilians is bad_ , he tries to tell himself in Kasmeer’s voice. _I’m a pretty human mesmer so naturally I always have trouble getting what I want from people_ , it adds of its own accord.

Canach takes another deep breath. Maybe he should find a different mental voice to give him advice.

“Mister giant choya,” pipes up a high, annoying voice. Canach glares down at the offender: a small human child.

“You look mad,” they remark.

Canach gives the child a lazy onceover. They are short, scrawny, and dirty.

“I am mad,” he replies. But perhaps this urchin can be of help. “I’m looking for a friend of mine. Dresses like he’s having an existential crisis, glows purple. Short. Have you seen him?”

The child purses their lips, tipping their head. “What if I have?” they say.

 _Don’t threaten the child. Don’t threaten the child._ “Then I will be _very_ grateful,” Canach grouses. Reluctantly, he adds, “And so will my purse.”

The child’s expression brightens. They hold out a hand and beam up at Canach expectantly, swaying on the balls of their feet.

Grumbling to himself, Canach flips them a silver coin. They snatch it eagerly, pocketing it.

“He’s at the bawdy house,” they trill.

He’s at the _what_? Canach stares for a full two seconds. “Are you… sure?” he says slowly.

The urchin shrugs. “Saw him go in not too long ago,” they say. They grin suddenly. “Why? He your _boyyyfriend_?”

“Don’t make me vomit,” Canach mutters, making an involuntary grimace at the thought. “I am many bad things, but incestuous isn’t one of them. Run along now, annoying little human.”

The child pulls a face at him, but trots off into the sand without further ushering. Canach hesitates as he considers whether to continue after Roza or go back to bed. It is… unusual of him to visit such a place, but Canach certainly isn’t one to drag him back out by the scruff of his neck, nor… _bother_ him. Roza _is_ an adult, albeit a young one.

But the thread of panic is still there; distant and duller, but persistent. Canach makes up his mind.

His pace is brisk, and the draped archways of the brothel come into view only a few minutes later. Canach barges in without any thought to decorum or subtlety, marching straight up to the wide-eyed woman who appears to be in charge.

“Where’s Roza?” he snaps at her startled expression.

Her mouth shuts, and she licks their lips. “We do not have any gentlelady by that name,” she says with a smooth, practiced smile. “But if you would like to peruse through our staff—"

“Not one of yours,” Canach grits out. The feeling of alarm is rising, and the urgency is wearing his patience thin. “Talking bloody tree, followed by dead things, blah blah. Short. Whatever he’s doing, he’s somewhere here, and I know you know _where_.”

The woman’s jaw clenches. “I am certain I do not know of whom you speak, outlander,” she says stiffly. “And even if I did, information about clients is strictly confidential. If you are not here to partake, I will have to ask you to—”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Canach mutters. He shoulders past her.

“Ser!” Canach ignores the woman’s cries as he stomps through the building. “Ser, you cannot simply—somebody, help! Anyone?!”

He ignores the rooms at the front that are blocked off only by thick curtains. Roza values his privacy almost more than his gold; he would be in one of the segregated areas. Canach walks past the rooms that are… loud, stopping behind a door in the middle when he hears a familiar voice from behind it. It is cold and brusque with formality, but jagged and raised.

Canach kicks the door open without a second thought. The words “I _didn’t_ ask for—” cut off abruptly.

Roza is sitting on the bed, bare-chested, looking a little shaken but mostly just uncomfortable. Kneeling next to him, one hand on his thigh, is… the courtesan from earlier that day.

“Canach?” Roza gasps. “What are you… what are you doing here?”

The barely perceptible tremor in his voice makes Canach scowl. He glowers at the human, who shrinks from his gaze.

“Just what is going on here?” he demands. He takes in Roza’s body language—hunched over, hugging himself protectively, legs very much crossed—and for a moment his voice tips dangerously. “Did they hurt you?”

Roza looks startled. “No!” he says at the same time the human pulls back, raising their hands. Canach doesn’t miss how Roza relaxes when they move away.

“I would never!” the human cries. “An unwilling client is not a client at all. Although I do not know why he… paid…”

They look at Roza in confusion. His gaze turns frosty and he huffs, raising his chin.

“You may leave us, Sahid,” he says stiffly. When the human glances between him and Canach uncertainly, Roza’s jaw clenches.

“Please,” he blurts. His face contorts like he just tasted something sour.

“Alright,” the courtesan mutters. “It is your money.”

With one last skeptical look, they leave the room. Canach shuts the door behind them as best he can, given its current condition. Then he goes over to Roza, bending down in front of him.

“What is going on?” he asks, studying him. Roza shakes his head, turning it away to the side to hide his face. “Roza?”

“I asked you first,” Roza mutters. His fingers clench in the bedsheets. “What are _you_ doing here?”

His tone is uppity and self-righteous, but he is still not looking at Canach, and his shoulders are tight with tension.

“Looking for you, little brother,” Canach replies.

Roza stills at that. Then he tugs at the bedsheets, trying to pull them up over his chest. He looks so… scrawny like this, not that Canach would ever say that out loud. Scrawny and not very strong at all.

“Well, you’ve found me,” he says crisply. “Now you can leave.”

Canach levels him with a look, even if he cannot see it. “Roza,” he says.

Roza ducks his head. For a moment it seems like he is warring with himself over whether or not to answer Canach’s question. Finally, his shoulders slump.

“I didn’t know… this was… this kind of place,” he begins hesitantly. He clears his throat, as if not liking how lost his voice comes out sounding.

Canach’s eyebrows raise. “A brothel?” he questions. At Roza’s careful nod, he snorts. “What did you think—what was it, Sahid?—wanted with you, then? Just the pleasure of your _delightful_ company?”

Roza winces. He says nothing for a long, awkward moment. And then, haltingly, “You said… that if I wanted him to touch me more, I could pay him.”

There is a pause in which Canach hears the words, digests the information, and slowly, painstakingly, figures out what he means.

 _“Oh_ ,” he says. His voice feels heavy.

Roza’s fists tighten. He tugs the blanket up higher. It is starting to come off the bed.

“Oh, that is so incredibly pathetic,” Canach breathes before he can stop himself. Roza freezes, tensing like a coiled spring, but Canach interrupts whatever angry show of vengeance he’s seconds away from enacting by cupping a hand on his shoulder.

“Like this?” he asks.

Roza looks at him for the first time this evening. His glare is _icy_. “Do not make fun of me,” he hisses, jerking away. “You don’t understand.”

Canach thinks he does. He steps back, looking for whatever strange garment Roza is calling a shirt now. He finds it on the ground on the opposite side of the bed. Picking it up, he holds it out.

“You look cold,” he says.

Roza snatches the shirt, making sure to fix Canach with his most threatening glower as he pulls it over his head. It doesn’t quite have the effect he wants it to; all Canach can think is that no matter how world-weary and imposing Roza may think himself, he is so very, very young.

Roza puts his hands in his lap, uncrosses his legs. Canach gives him roughly one second to gather himself before he sits down and wraps his arms around his short, scrawny frame.

At first, Roza’s only reaction is to freeze up, eyes going wide. Then slowly, the tension drains out of him. He drops his head onto Canach’s shoulder.

“Thank you,” he mumbles, very quietly.

“You’re supposed to hug me back, you unsocialized sapling,” Canach intones. “Honestly—if we’re going to be sickeningly sentimental, we may as well do it right.”

Roza snorts, but slowly snakes his arms around Canach’s waist. “What happened to ‘little brother?’” he questions.

“You can be both,” Canach replies. He feels more than hears Roza breathe out a laugh.

Canach waits for Roza to break the hug first, which he does after an abnormally long time. Canach would never admit, if pressed, that maybe, perhaps, it is a comfort they both needed. Because that would be ridiculous, and the only person that is even _allowed_ to think thoughts like that besides Canach himself is Roza. Who is in a gratifyingly similar position.

“Thank you for giving me my shirt,” Roza comments when they are simply sitting next to each other. Their legs are pressed together in a folded line, and they are leaning against each other, but Canach finds he does want to make light of it. “I didn’t… want to take it off.”

“So why did you?” Canach makes sure his tone implies that the very question itself should not need to be asked.

He feels Roza shrug. “They… seemed to want me to,” he mumbles. His head presses a little harder into Canach’s shoulder. “What else was I supposed to do?”

Canach frowns. “You can say no,” he says. “Did that thought never even cross your mind?”

“Just… tell them not to?” Roza sounds baffled. “But… people touch me all the time. And this time I—I _asked_ them to.”

Canach’s frown deepens. The idea that Roza has never told anyone to stop simply because he doesn’t _know_ to seems so absurdly simple that it almost makes sense that it has never crossed Canach’s mind. He lifts his head and nudges Roza off his shoulder, just so he can see his expression. But Roza is looking at him openly and honestly, all traces of standoffishness gone.

He tilts his head. “Who am I to tell other people what they can and cannot touch?” he says. He sounds as if he thinks that is an entirely sensible question too, by the Tree.

“Roza, it is your body,” Canach replies. He does not like how much of a knowledge gap this entire evening is implying. How many little rules like these is Roza completely unaware of? “Only you have a say on who touches you and how, no matter how casual the contact.”

Roza is starting to look at him in a way that is jarringly similar to the way new sprouts look at the mentors in the Grove. He nods. Canach winces.

“How old are you, again?” he finds himself asking.

Roza purses his lips. “Seven,” he says defensively. “Just.”

Canach thinks back on how much _he_ knew when he was seven. Then he does some quick mental math to figure out how many free years Roza had had to learn important information like this before most of his time became occupied with stopping rampaging Elder Dragons.

“Ah,” he says faintly.

Roza narrows his eyes. “There are sylvari Pact soldiers that have only just been born this year,” he says, as if pointing them out will somehow age him ten years. That familiar lofty tone is re-entering his voice. “I know _much_ more than they.”

Which is still, apparently, remarkably little. “You _do_ know what a brothel is, right?” Canach asks. “You know what they do here?”

Roza glares at him. “Yes,” he says.

Canach lets himself smile, delighting in the fact that Roza’s glare only intensifies. “And what is that, dear brother?” he drawls.

Roza pushes him away. “I think we are done touching,” he announces, standing up. “You said only I have a say on who touches me, right? That is enough of it being you. You smell bad. And your thorns prick.”

Canach smile turns into a grin. He has to bite his tongue to stop himself from making the joke he so dearly wishes to make. Appropriate setting, but most definitely inappropriate person. Who may or may not still be inclined to leave dead things in his boots.

“As you wish,” he declares instead, stretching before standing up as well. “Oh, and I think you’re going to have to pay for a new door. And perhaps a little extra for… shall we call it hurt feelings.”

“Hurt feelings?” Roza looks at him warily. “Canach, what did you do?”

Canach shrugs. “I simply worked my natural charm,” he says, pushing at the door. It opens the wrong way, and he makes a considering noise. “Now _that’s_ novel.”

“You ruined the—” Roza stalks over. He gives the door a onceover and groans, tugging at one of his branches. “ _Mulch_ , Canach. Why were you in such a hurry anyways? Wait—why were you even looking for me?”

There is no way Canach is ever answering _that_ question. “I was out for a walk and heard screaming. It turns out you were terrifying the locals with your abhorrent taste in fashion, and the fact that you look like an Awakened tree going through its teenage phase. I had to put an end to your dastardly deeds once and for all.”

Roza rolls his eyes (or at least Canach thinks he does). “Charming,” he says dryly. Then he tilts his head, studying Canach carefully. Canach hurries out the door, not wanting to wait as he takes his time figuring out what actually happened.

“You were worried about me,” he hears Roza say from behind him. The words are soft. “You felt…”

Apparently _not_ taking his time, then. Damn him for being quick.

“No,” Canach grouses.

“Canach,” Roza murmurs. His voice is still quiet, hushed in something like awe.

“I have never been worried about you for a single instant in my entire life,” Canach says over his shoulder. He is already leaving.

There is a pause, and then he hears Roza fall into step behind him. “Of course,” he agrees. He sounds like he is smiling.

There are half a dozen guards waiting for them in the foyer. Canach smiles, sweet as nectar, and pulls Roza in front of him. He gets an irritated huff, another eye roll, and his foot stepped on, but when the situation is finally settled a few minutes later, Roza is still leaning into Canach’s hand on his arm. He does not tell him to stop touching him.

So Canach doesn’t.

~*~

**Author's Note:**

> if you liked this, please feel free to tell me why! it is much appreciated <3


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